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This graph shows Daniel Kaluuya’s score on our annual analysis of leading stars at the box office. The Star Score represents points assigned to each of the leading stars of the top 100 movies (based on box office) in the current year and two preceding years. For appearing in the number one movie in a year a star gets 100 points, the number two movie 99 points and so on..

Black Panther was expected to be a hit; after all, it’s part of the MCU. However, almost no one was expecting it to become the biggest hit in the MCU. It is also considered the best film in the MCU by a lot of people. Am I one of them? If not, where does it fit?
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It’s Oscar night and we will be live blogging the show. We will announce the winners and have our reactions as they happen, while keeping track of how our readers did in predicting the outcomes.
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It’s Oscar night and we will be live blogging the show. Before that, let’s take a last look at the nominations with a few annotations. Nominees in Italics are those that have received the most votes from our readers so far in our Oscar contest (which is open to new entries until noon, Pacific, today—enter now!). Bold films are those films I think will win. Meanwhile, those that are Underlined are those I want to win. Not all categories have underlined nominees, because not all categories have someone I’m cheering for, or because there are two nominees I couldn’t pick between. For example, I will be happy no matter who wins Best Supporting Actress. One last note: The contest is still going and the leading for Best Picture Switched from The Shape of Water to Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri to tied over the time I was writing this story. This is the closest I’ve ever seen it. Guessing the best picture correctly will go a long way to winning.
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With our annual Oscar Prediction contest underway, now is the best time to look at the nominees and try and figure out who the favorites are and who should just feel honored to be nominated. This week we look at the four acting categories, continuing with Best Lead Actor. As with every other acting category, there is an overwhelming favorite.
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2018 got off to a good start and January more or less held its ground when compared to 2017. There were some misses, but surprise holdovers made up the difference. Looking forward, February will be dominated by Black Panther. In fact, it will very likely make more during its opening weekend than the second place film, Fifty Shades Freed, will likely make in total. Black Panther likely won’t break records, but it could come close, while Fifty Shade Freed and Peter Rabbit both have a 50/50 shot at $100 million. Last February, The Lego Batman Movie both earned $175 million, while Fifty Shades Darker earned over $100 million. Black Panther will easily beat any film from last February; in fact, it could earn more than the top two films earned combined. As long as the rest of the box office isn’t a complete disaster, February should help 2018 earn a significant edge over 2017 in the year-over-year comparisons.
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The Oscar nominations were announced starting at just after 5 am Pacific time. They do this every year and no one has been able to adequately explain why to me. At least there were some interesting results this year. The Shape of Water led the way with 13 nominations, which is one below the current record and nearly as many as the next two films combined. Overall, there were seventeen films that earned two or more nominations.
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The BAFTA nominations were announced and this time The Shape of Water led the way with 12 nominations. The same films appear on many of the lists of nominees, but so far no one film has come to dominate the list. This makes it interesting, to say the least. There’s a good chance no one film will win the majority of prestige awards and that multiple films will have lots of reason to celebrate on February 18th when the awards are handed out.
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The Golden Globes nominations are the second major Awards Season set to come out. Sort of. (WGA announced the nominations for TV, radio, etc., but not their theatrical nods.) It is still very early in the year, so it is hard to say if there are any real snubs, or if there are any real favorites. The Shape of Water led the way with seven nominations, while The Post and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri were right behind with six a piece.
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The Independent Spirit Awards nominations were announced yesterday and thus the 2017 Awards Season begins. The movie with the most nominations is Call Me by Your Name, which opens on Friday. This is amazingly good timing. It’s not the only film that should get a financial boost.
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Get Out is inarguably the biggest surprise hit of the year. It earned over $200 million worldwide on just a $5 million budget. It also earned 100% positive reviews. (Armond White doesn’t count, because he’s not a real critic. Roger Ebert himself called Armond White a Troll.) Does the film live up to its success? Is it even medically possible for it to live up to its success?
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January turned out to be a good month. Granted, it didn’t live up to last January, but its box office was one of the top five Januarys of all time, so that’s still a good start to the year. Also, we will have our first $100 million movie released in 2017 and that doesn’t happen this early very often. As for February, there’s potentially the first $200 million hit of the year, The Lego Batman Movie. Fifty Shades Darker and The Great Wall both have a shot at $100 million. That said, it is more likely that both will miss that milestone than both will get there. As for the rest of the films, there are a few that are aiming for solid midlevel hits, like John Wick: Chapter Two and Get Out, while there are very few potential bombs. By comparison, last February there was one monster hit, Deadpool, and a lot of bombs. No other movie besides Deadpool made $50 million. No movie opening this month will match Deadpool, but we won’t have as many bombs either, so hopefully that will balance out and 2017 won’t fall further behind 2016.
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